Many products, including consumer goods, technology devices, food industry containers, and the like include a recyclable polymeric material plated, painted, adhered, dyed, covered in part with ink, or otherwise coated with another material. Examples of consumer goods may include toys, household items, kitchen products, and the like. Examples of technology devices may include compact discs, digital video discs, and the like. Food industry containers may include food containers, beverage containers, and the like. Plating materials may include metals, including electroplating of materials used in electronic media, decorative items, and the like. Painting materials may include paints as typically used in products to decorate, color, label, mark, differentiate, and the like. Adhesive materials may include glues, cements, bonding agents, or the like. Inks may include general inks used to provide labeling, information, mark, differentiate, and the like.
Recyclable polymer materials coated with a coating material may not be easily recyclable due to the presence of the other material. The coating material may be separated recyclable or non-recyclable. The coating material may need to be removed from the polymeric material in order to effect recycling of the polymeric material, the coating material, or both. Physically removing a coating material from a polymeric material in order to recycle the polymeric material may be at the very least impractical, if not very difficult. As a result, coated polymeric materials may be discarded rather than recycled, simply because recycling of these materials may not be cost-effective.
Alternatively, it may be desirable to remove a coating from a material for any of a variety of reasons, not limited to recycling of either of the materials.
What is needed is a system for removing a coating from a material, including a material to be recycled.